There are at least nine Provisional republicans still in prison, five in this State and four in the United States, despite the progress of the peace process and the early-release arrangements under the Belfast Agreement, writes Jim Cusack, Security Editor.
The five men in Castlerea Prison are expected to lodge an appeal on the grounds that the Government is contravening the terms of the Belfast Agreement.
If this action succeeds it could mean that Gerard Sheehy, Michael O'Neill and Kevin Walsh, all of Limerick and Pearse McCauley, from Tyrone will have served between two and three years in custody for killing Det Garda Jerry McCabe.
At their trial the State dropped murder charges after a witness was apparently intimidated into withdrawing evidence and the four pleaded guilty to the lesser charge of manslaughter. The fifth prisoner, John Quinn, was sentenced to four years imprisonment for conspiracy to rob in the same case. He should be due for release under normal parole conditions next year.
The few remaining Provisional republican prisoners outside the State include three men and a woman arrested in south Florida a year ago for arms smuggling. Conor Claxton (27), from west Belfast; Martin Mullan, a Sinn Fein member from Dunloy, Co Antrim, and Anthony Smyth, formerly of Belfast but resident in Florida for 15 years, were convicted of conspiracy to smuggle more than 100 weapons to the IRA in 1999.
A Cork-born woman, Siobhan Browne, who has also been resident in Florida for over a decade pleaded guilty to conspiracy to violate firearms purchasing laws.
The four are in prison in Florida awaiting sentence on August 18th.
